1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to navigating a three-dimensional space and, more specifically, to a physical object for intuitive navigation in a three-dimensional space.
2. Description of the Related Art
Several different techniques for manipulating the viewpoints needed to view one or more three-dimensional (3D) graphics objects displayed to an end-user within a display are known in the art. For example, in one implementation, an end-user may employ the drag-and-drop function of a mouse to rotate a viewpoint within the display. Here, the end-user clicks arrows provided on the screen to zoom or pan the viewpoint. In another implementation, a virtual cube may be presented to the end-user in a corner of the display. To rotate the viewpoint, the end-user employs the mouse to rotate the virtual cube. Other implementations similarly involve a user employing a mouse, keyboard and/or touch screen to enter commands to manipulate viewpoints used to view the graphics objects within the display.
One drawback of these different approaches to manipulating the viewpoints of graphics objects within a display is that the approaches are not intuitive to the end-user. As a consequence, the end-user must invest an excessive amount of time into thinking and planning the steps that she would take to manipulate the 3D space to reach her desired final viewpoint and/or final graphics object state. In addition, manipulating the viewpoint in an indirect fashion using a mouse and keyboard is oftentimes cumbersome and frustrating to the end-user.
As the foregoing illustrates, what is needed in the art is a more intuitive way for end-users to manipulate and view graphics objects within a display.